THE DAIRY RAVENSBOURNE CORE AERATION

In 2026, 1st Class Lawn Care core-aerated approximately 700 m² of established kikuyu turf on the large terrace at The Dairy, Ravensbourne.

We used our Ryan Lawnaire 28 with hollow coring tines to physically remove soil cores and create openings through the compacted kikuyu profile.

One full aeration pass was completed across approximately 700 m² of the venue’s large kikuyu terrace.

The terrace regularly accommodates venue guests and events. Repeated foot traffic had contributed to compaction, poor water penetration and declining turf performance.

The hollow tines penetrated approximately 2.5 inches into the soil, helping address compaction beneath the turf rather than only disturbing the surface.

The extracted soil cores were left on the terrace to dry, break apart and be progressively mown back into the established kikuyu surface.

In August 2026, 1st Class Lawn Care completed commercial hollow-tine core aeration across approximately 700 square metres of established kikuyu turf on the large event terrace at The Dairy, Ravensbourne, near Toowoomba. The terrace regularly accommodates venue guests and experiences concentrated pedestrian traffic during events. Repeated foot traffic had contributed to soil compaction, poor water penetration and declining kikuyu performance.

The terrace was irrigated before aeration to provide suitable soil moisture for tine penetration and core extraction. Our team then used a Ryan Lawnaire 28 commercial aerator fitted with 19 mm hollow coring tines. One complete aeration pass covered the entire 700 m² terrace, with the tines penetrating approximately 2.5 inches or 64 mm into the soil profile.

The Ryan Lawnaire 28’s published specifications include a 28-inch aeration width, an aeration pattern of approximately 3.5 inches by 5 inches and a maximum working depth of 2.5 inches. The machine is rated to produce up to 12 holes per square foot during one pass. Its 19 mm hollow tines physically extracted plugs containing soil, roots and turf material, creating open aeration channels through the compacted kikuyu profile rather than merely puncturing the lawn surface.

The large kikuyu terrace at The Dairy, Ravensbourne is used predominantly as a wedding venue and event space and regularly carries concentrated pedestrian traffic. Repeated foot traffic compresses the soil particles beneath the turf, reduces pore space and can restrict the movement of water, oxygen and nutrients through the root zone. By August 2026, the approximately 700 m² terrace was affected by compaction, poor water penetration and declining turf performance.

Hollow-tine core aeration was selected because it physically removes plugs from the compacted soil profile. This differs from solid-tine aeration, where the tine enters and withdraws without extracting soil. The terrace was irrigated before work commenced, providing soil moisture to support penetration and help the 19 mm hollow tines extract intact cores.

Our Ryan Lawnaire 28 completed one full pass across the kikuyu terrace at an approximate depth of 2.5 inches or 64 mm. Its published aeration pattern is approximately 3.5 inches by 5 inches, with the capacity to produce up to 12 holes per square foot in one pass. This created a distributed network of open channels through the compacted profile and directly treated the soil beneath the high-use venue lawn rather than applying a surface-only treatment.

The Ryan Lawnaire 28’s 19 mm hollow tines extracted soil and turf cores across approximately 700 m² of kikuyu on the large terrace at The Dairy, Ravensbourne. These cores were deliberately left on the lawn rather than collected and removed. They were intended to dry, break apart and be progressively mown back into the established kikuyu surface through the venue’s normal lawn-maintenance process.

The extracted plugs contained existing soil, roots and organic turf material from the terrace. Leaving them in place allowed that material to be redistributed over the lawn as the cores dried and were broken down by subsequent mowing. Removing the cores would have added an unnecessary collection stage and taken existing soil material away from the lawn.

The work completed by 1st Class Lawn Care in August 2026 consisted of pre-irrigation followed by one complete hollow-tine aeration pass using 19 mm tines at an approximate depth of 2.5 inches or 64 mm. No fertiliser, wetting agent, topdressing or additional treatment was applied by our team during this project.